Place Attachment and Environmentally Responsible Behavior: The Mediating Role of Destination Psychological Ownership

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The manuscript is well written and organised. The literature review is comprehensive. The following are some comments for further improvement

Authors would like to use place attachment as an independent variable to predict ERB. However, many literatures indicate Place attachment could be cateogised into Place Identity, Place Affect, Social Bonding and Place dependence. Why the author only use Place dependence and place identity for their study? I think the authors require a detail discussion on the omission of the other two aspects.

Author Response

Point 1: The manuscript is well written and organised. The literature review is comprehensive. The following are some comments for further improvement. Authors would like to use place attachment as an independent variable to predict ERB. However, many literatures indicate Place attachment could be cateogised into Place Identity, Place Affect, Social Bonding and Place dependence. Why the author only use Place dependence and place identity for their study? I think the authors require a detail discussion on the omission of the other two aspects.

 Response 1:

Thank you for your useful comments and suggestions. The author has done a considerable amount of effort to response the reviewers’ comments. We have added descriptions in the revised version as follows (Please see the changes as from Line 176 to Line 188 of the revised version):

Researchers have generally conceived place attachment as a multidimensional construct, such as social bonding, affective attachment, place identity and place dependence. The number of salient dimensions and their relationships with antecedents and outcome variables vary across contexts and samples [53]. Nonetheless, it has been noted that bi-dimensional conceptualization is prevalent in the literature namely, place identity and place dependence. Moreover, in the literature discussing the relationship between place attachment and ERB, many literatures also use bi-dimensional conceptualization, for example, Vaske and Kobrin [21], Cheng, Wu, and Huang [54], Lee [20], Cheng and Wu [18]. And the conclusions of these literatures are quite consistent. For example, place attachment will directly and positively affect ERB [18, 20, 54], and place dependence will directly affect place identity [21]. In order to compare and discuss with the results of the above research, in this study, the measurement of place attachment also adopts bi-dimensional conceptualization.

Reviewer 2 Report

The article can be improved with editing, avoiding repeating arguments, presenting also the questionnaire used. One has also to consider and comment on the central item/the basis of your study: scuba diving , to qualify the general interpretations presented.

Author Response

Point 1: The article can be improved with editing, avoiding repeating arguments, presenting also the questionnaire used. One has also to consider and comment on the central item/the basis of your study: scuba diving , to qualify the general interpretations presented.

Response 1:

Thank you for your useful comments and suggestions. The author has done a considerable amount of effort to response the reviewers’ comments. We have added the questionnaire used in the revised version. Please see the changes as from Line 605 to Line 608 of the revised version.

Moreover, we have added descriptions in the revised version as follows (Please see the changes as from Line 494 to Line 499  of the revised version):

Goal 14 of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) aims to conserve and sustainably use oceans and marine resources to ensure sustainable development by the year 2030, which should help to achieve overall development plans, reduce future economic, environmental and social costs, strengthen economic competitiveness and reduce poverty. According to this, first, the managers of diving recreation sites must be able to consider the right strategy created by adopting the results of this study in achieving the SDGs.

Reviewer 3 Report

Dear Authors,

Thanks for your paper, it was very interesting to read. 

This paper aims the relationship between place attachment and environmentally responsible behaviour. Furthermore, it aims to verify the relationship between place dependence and place identity when measuring place attachment.

This research is considered sound, as it seems to study a trend with the increasing interest of the role of Place attachment. Tourism is all about places and people. Place attachment is commonly referred as the total engagement of a tourist with the setting of a tourism place. The study aims to acknowledge that attempts to analyse the correlation between Place Attachment and Place Identity as key parameters used to quantify the Mediating Effect of Destination Psychological Ownership towards the destination.  It is under the acknowledge of the need for further research in place attachment that this research arouses. Place attachment is a result of a combination of emotional, cognitive, social, cultural and behavioural factors.

A set of quantitative methods was the method chosen as an analysis model to support the analysis and predictions, such as using the maximum likelihood estimation method (MLE) for parameter estimation. However, the important problems lie in the sample and in literature review, which need substantial improvements, in order to achieve the aimed contributions of this study. Detailed comments are as follows:

A further literature review on Place attachment, Sustainability and Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) is perhaps necessary. The review works done by some of the bellow mentioned authors might add some insights on this topic.:

• Pruneau, D, Chouinard, O, Arsenault, C & Breau, N. (1999), 'An Intergenerational Education Project Aiming at the Improvement of People’s Relationship with their Environment', International Research in Geographical and Environmental Education, vol. 8, no. 1, pp. 26–39.
• Stedman, R., Jorgensen, B.S., (2006). A comparative analysis of predictors of sense of place dimensions: Attachment to, dependence on, and identification with lakeshore properties. Journal of Environmental Management, 79, 316–327.
• Scannell, L., & Gifford, R. (2010). Defining place attachment: A tripartite organizing framework. Journal of Environmental Psychology, 30(1), 1-10.
• Gu, H., & Ryan, C. (2008). Place attachment, identity and community impacts of tourism the case of a Beijing Hutong. Tourism Management, 29(4), 637-647.
• Baloglu, S., & McCleary, K. W. (1999). A model of destination image formation. Annals of tourism research, 26(4), 868-897.
• Baloglu, S. (2000). A path analytic model of visitation intention involving information sources, socio-psychological motivations, and destination image, Journal of Travel & Tourism Marketing, 8(3), 81-90.
• Baker, D. A. y Crompton, J. L. (2000). Quality, satisfaction and behavioural intentions. Annals of Tourism Research, 27, 785-804.
• Boo, S., Busser, J. y Baloglu, S. (2009). A model of customer-based brand equity and its application to multiple destinations. Tourism Management, 30: 219–231.
• Chen, C. y Phou, S. (2013). A closer look at destination: image, personality, relationship and loyalty, Tourism Management, 36, 269-278.
• Okello, M. y Yerian, S. (2009). Tourist satisfaction in relation to attractions and implications for conservation in the protected areas of the Northern Circuit, Tanzania. Journal of Sustainable Tourism, 17, (5): 605 - 625.
• Pike, S. y Ryan, C. (2004). “Destination Positioning Analysis Through a Comparison of Cognitive, Affective, and Conative Perceptions”. Journal of Travel Research, Vol.42 (4), pp.333-342.

The sample nature suggests that the study findings should be interpreted with caution for several reasons.

• First, the analysis of the populations of study does not discriminate, domestic from international tourists, so it does not allow generalizations for the whole tourists, also the specific geographical context limits comparisons within different cultural contexts. Future studies should test the model in other locations and among domestic and international tourists.
• Also important is the duration of the relation with a certain place as may be measured by a quantitative variable, as it is the case of this research Stdeman & Jorgensen (2006).
• In addition, further studies should consider that emotions were measured using self-report over past the experiences. This type of evaluation can lack of accuracy since one depends on memories to capture emotional reactions (Cutler, Larsen, & Bruce, 1996).

Therefore, the results may be biased, and the conclusions are difficult to extract.  If the intention of the authors is to state this limitation of this study, this should be clearly stated.

In Discussion 6.3. Managerial Implications, some recommendations for the managers of companies that receive divers, are made, for example experiences they can improve to construct a long lasting “emotional connection between divers and diving sites” and to promote Environmental behaviours towards conservation. These considerations fail to mention large world programs such as “The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, adopted by all United Nations Member” since they have an available source of policies and indicators to be carried out by these destinations.

To help improve the paper, I have the following suggestions: 

• Conduct the recommended the literature review for further discussion and understanding of these trends.
• Correct all aspects mentioned in the above comments.

Overall it is a good research, however there are areas that needs improvement.

Best regards

Author Response

Point 1: A further literature review on Place attachment, Sustainability and Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) is perhaps necessary. The review works done by some of the bellow mentioned authors might add some insights on this topic.

 Response 1:

Thank you for your useful comments and suggestions. The author has done a considerable amount of effort to response the reviewers’ comments. We have added descriptions in the revised version as follows (Please see the changes as from Line 79 to Line100,  Line 176 to Line 188 , Line 494 to Line 499, Line 505 to Line 516 of the revised version):

Line 79 to Line 100

Place attachment is a concept, which aims to synthesize the many facets of people-place relationships into a single-framework to enable a systemic analysis of those place-associated themes [10]. One of the more recent approaches to place attachment is the “Person-Process-Place” framework [10]. This particular framework attempts to highlight the multi-dimensionality of the place attachment concept. The first dimension would be the person. In this dimension, place attachment occurs both on individual and group levels. The second dimension displays a combination of psychological processes that are manifested in place attachment such as affect, cognition and behavior. The third dimension concerns the object, towards which the attachment has formed. In this dimension, place characteristics are explored, such as the nature of the place and specific elements of the place that have become objects for attachment [10].

In the “Process“ dimension, based on social bonding and affective attachment for a local environment, the physical and social attributes at a place may give rise to a strong sense of place identity involving not only localized experiences but also specific memories about how others feel about the place [22]. That is to say, when an individual incorporates himself into the local environment and cognate that he belongs to this place, he will identify with the place, and even produce the behavior of attaching to the place [23]. Moreover, as a behavior domain of sense of place [23], the place dependence refers to the behavioral exclusivity of the place in comparison to alternatives. Individual perceive the functional meanings of a place as special to them as it is a suitable setting to take on a certain activity [24]. However a person may not be aware of their place dependence until an area is under threat, at which time a person’s link to a place is recognized [25].

Line 176 to Line188

Researchers have generally conceived place attachment as a multidimensional construct, such as social bonding, affective attachment, place identity and place dependence. The number of salient dimensions and their relationships with antecedents and outcome variables vary across contexts and samples [53]. Nonetheless, it has been noted that bi-dimensional conceptualization is prevalent in the literature namely, place identity and place dependence. Moreover, in the literature discussing the relationship between place attachment and ERB, many literatures also use bi-dimensional conceptualization, for example, Vaske and Kobrin [21], Cheng, Wu, and Huang [54], Lee [20], Cheng and Wu [18]. And the conclusions of these literatures are quite consistent. For example, place attachment will directly and positively affect ERB [18, 20, 54], and place dependence will directly affect place identity [21]. In order to compare and discuss with the results of the above research, in this study, the measurement of place attachment also adopts bi-dimensional conceptualization.

Line 494 to Line 499

Goal 14 of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) aims to conserve and sustainably use oceans and marine resources to ensure sustainable development by the year 2030, which should help to achieve overall development plans, reduce future economic, environmental and social costs, strengthen economic competitiveness and reduce poverty. According to this, first, the managers of diving recreation sites must be able to consider the right strategy created by adopting the results of this study in achieving the SDGs.

Line 505 to Line 516

Secondly, Baloglu and McCleary [86] state that the cognitive and affective evaluation for recreational sites will help shape the destination image, and then produce attachments to recreational areas [87]. Therefore, The managers should then reshape the key elements that could affect diving sites' image, including services, products, atmosphere, and facilities. Next, they can effectively convey the shaped destination image to the target tourists and attract divers to re-visit the site by facilitating marketing activities and dialogue with tourists, resulting in an enhanced consistency between the characteristics of recreational sites and the self-identity of tourists [21, 88, 89, 90]. Further, managers should devote themselves to improving the relevant recreational resources of diving sites, enhancing the richness and differentiation of software and hardware to meet divers' experiential needs [24]. The tourists’ ERB would be stimulated when they develop a place attachment to the diving sites.

Point 2: The sample nature suggests that the study findings should be interpreted with caution for several reasons.

• First, the analysis of the populations of study does not discriminate, domestic from international tourists, so it does not allow generalizations for the whole tourists, also the specific geographical context limits comparisons within different cultural contexts. Future studies should test the model in other locations and among domestic and international tourists.
• Also important is the duration of the relation with a certain place as may be measured by a quantitative variable, as it is the case of this research Stdeman & Jorgensen (2006).
• In addition, further studies should consider that emotions were measured using self-report over past the experiences. This type of evaluation can lack of accuracy since one depends on memories to capture emotional reactions (Cutler, Larsen, & Bruce, 1996).

Therefore, the results may be biased, and the conclusions are difficult to extract.  If the intention of the authors is to state this limitation of this study, this should be clearly stated.

 Response 2:

Thank you brining this to our attention. These suggestions are very important and highly valuable. We very agree with the reviewer’s suggestion on the “7. Conclusions and Future Work”. We have made our utmost effort to improve our manuscript as follows (Please see the changes as from Line 531 to Line 585 of the revised version):

Although previous studies have generally agreed that place attachment affects ERB and that their relationship is direct [5, 18, 19, 20, 21, 54, 56], only a few studies have attempted to explore how the two sub-construct of place attachment (place dependence and place identity) affect ERB and the mechanism or way through which place attachment affects ERB. This study examined the structural relationships among place dependence, place identity, DPO, and ERB to fill these research gaps. Although some of these relationships have been discussed in the literature, the structural relationships between these variables have not been examined simultaneously. We could clarify the previously proposed but uncensored tourist behavior model through the mediating effect testing of DPO. Therefore, this research contributes to the literature on sustainable tourism and behavior research.

Moreover, this research proposes the following recommendations for future research. First, the types of recreational activities might interfere with the relationship between place dependence, place identity, DPO and ERB. The mainly activity of this study was scuba diving.  This activity is a highly specialized recreational activity Therefore, the analysis result of this study might not be generalizable to all recreational activities, which is one of the limitations of this study.

Second, this study only sampled domestic tourists, and did not include international tourists. Since the specific geographical context limits comparisons within different cultural contexts, the results of this study may not allow generalization of the entire tourist. Future studies should test the generalization ability of the model in other locations and among domestic and international tourists.

Third, due to the limitations of time, resources and manpower, this study can only adopt Cross-sectional methodology and cannot conduct longitudinal methodology. Of course, it is relatively easy to explore the relationship between the various variables using a cross-sectional methodology, but the interaction and the change process between place attachment and ERB in the time axis cannot be observed. Therefore, it is recommended to use longitudinal methodology in follow-up research, so that the interaction and change process of place attachment and ERB can be continuously tracked in the same place.

Fourth, in the measurement of emotional variables, this study adopts the self-report method, this type of evaluation could lack of accuracy since one depends on memories to capture emotional reactions. Therefore, for the measurement of emotional variables, it is recommended that future researchers may use more suitable methods, such as experience-sampling (ESM) technique [92]

Fifth, in a diversified democratic society, it is not enough to rely solely on personal environmental responsibility to protect environmental resources [93, 94]. Therefore, the diving industry or the government should promote the development of pressure groups or environmental protection groups to take action on environmental issues, which would be crucial to solving environmental problems in a democratic society [95]. “The Clean Up the World Weekend,” which was advocated by Clean Up the World, an Australian international environmental protection organization, is an excellent case. This research only dis-cussed the ERB of individuals, which is another limitation of this research. Future research could explore the tourists’ development and investment of environmental behavior in the organization.

Sixth, the mechanism that can trigger tourists' ERB is not limited to the variables discussed in this study such as place dependence, place identity, and DPO. On the contrary, ERB may also be interfered by other variables in the recreation process (such as recreational impact and recreational pressure). Further, the early use experience is an important influencing factor.

Seventh, the concept of integrated marketing has fully exerted long-term effects in various fields, and the marketing of environmental activities is insufficient in the field of recreation. Scholars could develop a complete mechanism of environmental behavior in various recreational areas based on the above findings in future research. The government or the industry could develop more diversified environmental protection actions based on users’ recreational preferences for recreational environments.

Point 3: In Discussion 6.3. Managerial Implications, some recommendations for the managers of companies that receive divers, are made, for example experiences they can improve to construct a long lasting “emotional connection between divers and diving sites” and to promote Environmental behaviours towards conservation. These considerations fail to mention large world programs such as “The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, adopted by all United Nations Member” since they have an available source of policies and indicators to be carried out by these destinations.

Response 3:

Thank you for your useful comments and suggestions. The author has done a considerable amount of effort to response the reviewers’ comments. We have added descriptions in the revised version as follows (Please see the changes as from Line 494 to Line 499 of the revised version):

Goal 14 of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) aims to conserve and sustainably use oceans and marine resources to ensure sustainable development by the year 2030, which should help to achieve overall development plans, reduce future economic, environmental and social costs, strengthen economic competitiveness and reduce poverty. According to this, first, the managers of diving recreation sites must be able to consider the right strategy created by adopting the results of this study in achieving the SDGs.

Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

The paper has bee substantially improved.

Minor editing of english language structure (please have a last check) I.e. in the abstract you can avoid past tense)